In 2017, Pearl Academy is braced to modernize the institution, increase the number of students and shake up its cozy existence at Naraina Industrial Complex. Though our older campus is much loved, its building has been bursting at the seams with creativity needing new ground to spring from. So we are extending our community only 3 km away to Rajouri Garden, a gleaming new 100,000 sq ft home for the fashion, media and design departments. It houses a gallery, lecture theatre and business incubation hub, a brand new “eclectic arts factory” that stands proudly on the street corner as an unabashed urban college situated smack in the heart of all the neighborhood’s commercial activity.
The new campus is designed keeping the needs of designers and students in mind, providing them with a contemporary architectural canvas that is permeated with slick classrooms and wide collaborative spaces perfect for the 21st century learner. The sheer scale of it all is wholly unexpected and space is certainly the dominant feature. Our ultra-modern building is waiting for students and staff to stamp their own identity onto the building- the walls, nooks and corridors are to be enlivened by paintings, sculptures, clothes, prints, videos and other projects that will start bubbling as classes begin. There are industrial glazed studios and libraries full of resources primed for just about every creative discipline you can think of, book stacks squeezed between iron columns ripe with books and magazines to nourish hungry minds.
As students and visitors wander through the building’s carefully crafted sequence of spaces, they will recognize our aspiration to create an environment that heightens the creative and production process. For instance we have sliced openings of skylight into our academic wings, so that students receive natural light through the course of their day, reducing energy costs and more importantly, increasing well-being. The floor plan is designed with ample opportunities for collaboration, open spaces offering peaceful thinking spots and seamless extensions of classrooms.
Rajouri Garden’s campus is a true interdisciplinary hub. Here, the four schools are not isolated from each other but stay united on common ground. Students from across the disciplines have the unique opportunity to learn from exposure to diverse aspects of the art & media industry. By virtue of shared space, ideas, concepts and networks flourish to find new forms of expression.
